


Displaced

by Vituperative_cupcakes



Category: Pet Shop of Horrors
Genre: Adoption, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-18
Updated: 2015-10-31
Packaged: 2018-04-26 22:08:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5022310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vituperative_cupcakes/pseuds/Vituperative_cupcakes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adopted after their first daughter was kidnapped, Kara has never really felt completely at home with the Vogels. Will adopting a pet from D help her, or will it make things worse?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

D was pouring gold pellets into dish for the Alicanto when the shop bell rang. He could not stop himself from turning, even thought he knew it would not, could never be the person he was thinking of.

A girl walked in, brown hair, light eyes. Dressed well but modestly. Already a plan was forming in his head when he swept forward for a greeting.

“Hello, and welcome to D's petshop.” he said, extending a milk-white hand.

The girl's hand, extended to meet him, pointed at his face.

“Ooh, heterochromia!” she said.

D drew back and blinked. “That's not a greeting I'm familiar with.”

The girl dropped her hands and tugged on her skirt, suddenly self conscious. “No, ah, sorry. I'm a bit weird. It's just I noticed you have eyes of two different colors. The scientific term is heterochromia. I know because I have that too, see?” She pointed to her eyes. The left was green and the right was blue. If D hadn't been looking for it, he might not have noticed it.

Then again, he might have.

“That's very interesting, miss...?”

The girl's mouth dropped slightly at the corners. “...Vogel.”

“Ah.” D snapped his fingers. “The Vogel family, of course! You must be young Sarah.”

The girl winced. “No, actually, I'm...my name's Kara.”

“Ah, please excuse me. English is not my first language.”

“No, it's...it's fine.” The girl's body language said it was not fine, any shade of fine, but she kept smiling.

D quirked an eyebrow. “Well, my dear Kara, what can I help you with today?”

Kara hesitated on the threshold. She kept her hand on her bag as if she might have to dash away quickly for some reason. It was a position her body went to naturally.

“I'm not sure,” Kara admitted, “it's probably stupid, I mean...”

D waited patiently. No matte how hesitant, no one walked in the door unless they had a reason to come in. Sometimes it was just a matter of letting people talk themselves into it.

Kara took a deep breath. “Okay. I'll just get right into it. You've heard of my family?”

D pondered. “A bit, yes. Your family is old, and has been in this town since its founding.”

“Did you hear what _happened_ to my family?”

“I'm afraid I haven't.”

Kara swallowed. “Well...to tell you the truth, sir, I'm adopted.” She let that drop into the silence like a rock in a pond. “I wasn't adopted under happy circumstances. My mother and I have a...strained relationship, to put it lightly. She might say things like, ' _don't you want a pet?_ ' but she might not really mean it.”

D kept his face placid and calm. “I see.”

“I guess I can't really mince words, now that I've told you that. I'll be eighteen soon. I won't be their legal responsibility anymore. I don't know if they'll want me living there then. So you see...”

D nodded. “I can make the connection. Would you perhaps prefer a pet that can be...temporary?”

Kara looked down. Her left hand played with the catch on her bag. Her mismatched eyes studied the elaborate pattern of D's rug.

“Couldn't hurt, I guess,” she sighed.

 

D was careful to lead her through one of the more benign passages. He didn't want to use the incense if she just turned out to be a run-of-the-mill pet shopper.

“What kind of pet did you have in mind, Miss Vogel?”

“Well, D—may I call you D?—I would like something quiet. But not a fish. I want a little noise to let me know it's still alive. I just don't want a lot of barking or meowing—something with a more pleasant sound?”

D smiled in the dark. She had made up her mind before realizing it.

“Let me show you the aviary, then.”

It looked like a gazebo woven from lace. Kara gasped, even though she only saw the birds as birds. D appreciated that.

“As you can see, I have many exotic species as well as specimens you might find in any other store. Of course, finance is not the only question here. What kind of space do you have?”

Kara was lost in the ceiling. “I dunno, um...a regular room. Kinda big. Could I keep a cage out on the porch? When the weather's nice, I mean.”

“You might.” D set the bowl of gold out. The Alicanto winged down and began gulping down pellets.

Kara pointed. “Is that one good indoors?”

D had to stifle a laugh. “I'm sorry, that one's a little out of your price range.” He patted her shoulder. “No need to narrow your selection, have a look around!”

Kara paced around the aviary, eye out for piles of guano. Even before entering the room she had used delicate, measured steps as if she was afraid of breaking the ground she stepped on.

“How do your parents feel about pets, Kara?”

Kara smiled, or rather, her lips went back in a practiced path. “I don't know how they feel. They had a dog before...before I was adopted. They haven't had one since.”

D could see a lot in the gap of that pause.

Kara kept walking. Occasionally she put her hand out to touch a bird, but they always flew away.

“I'm a replacement child,” she said as if remembering something trivial.

D did not even nod.

“My parents had a daughter before me. She was kidnapped. Does this sound familiar now? It was all over the news. The ransom drop went bad and they never saw her again. I came along a few years later. I was four.” Her voice, which had made an admirable effort to be steady in the beginning, had started shaking. Kara swiped a sleeve over her eyes and laughed. “Her name was Sarah. I don't see why they had to name me something so...anyway, I'm never going to be first in their hearts, so I don't want to push it too far.”

She stopped by a perch. “Sorry. I guess I don't talk about this a lot.”

D smiled genially. “No need to apologize. It's the people who hold back when they tell me what they're looking for, those are the ones that give me grief. You should have seen the couple who bought a goat and neglected to tell me that they live in an apartment.”

Kara laughed, a sniffly little sound. The bird she had stopped near had a glossy black body and a brown head. She experimentally lifted a finger to its breast. The bird hopped up, completely unafraid. Kara's face glowed.

“Who's this little guy?”

“That's a cowbird, a species native to this continent. Are you familiar with the cowbird?”

“No.” She was completely smitten with its beady little eyes.

D's lowered his lids, studying her through his lashes. “I see.” he walked over. “the cowbird is part of the _Icterid_ family, a relation of the more brightly-colored Orioles. It's a fairly common species in this area, so if you should have to move...” he let the idea dangle.

Kara nodded. “I see. Friendly little guy, isn't he? Will he want company?”

D laughed a little to himself. “Probably not. Just give him food and water, pay attention to him and don't leave his cage near a draft, and he will live a long, full life.”

Kara smiled. The little bird re-balanced itself to stay on her hand while she moved.

“I think I'll take him.”

The contract was simple enough. D watched as Kara signed it with elegant, swooping cursive. She got a bamboo cage and a small packet of bird feed. She was very careful with the cage and its tweeting inhabitant.

“...and here's the number of a veterinarian specializing in so-called 'wild pets,' you can give him a call should anything arise.”

“Thank you.” Kara accepted the number and edged slowly to the door.

“The food should last you a little under a week. And Miss Vogel?”

Kara stopped, half-in, half-out of the door.

“Good luck.”

 

The house was cold when she got home. That wasn't surprising. Even though they had enough money to heat the entire city for a year, the 'rents always insisted on keeping the house temp low to save on gas.

' _Cardigans cost less and smell better!_ ' Kara said internally as she hung her coat up.

“I'm home!” she called.

No answer. That didn't necessarily mean no one was home. Judy would sometimes sit silently in a room with the lights off. Kara left her to it and climbed the stairs.

Thankfully, thrift did not extend to her room. Kara switched on the space heater and set the bird on her desk.

“Just you wait right here,” she said, “you'll be warm in no time.”

The bird jumped from bar to bar, chirping. She had to give him a name before she introduced him to the 'rents. She was seesawing between Ziggy Stardust and MacPhisto as she went downstairs to get a hook and hammer.

Bradley was unloading bags in the kitchen. Kara pecked him on the cheek as she walked by.

“Hi Brad, I got a bird today, hanging a hook in my room, hope that's okay,” Kara said in one breath.

Brad grunted to himself. Kara went to the workroom and fished a plant-hanger hook from the drawer, grabbed a hammer from the table, and went back out again. Bradley was putting meat into the deep freeze.

“Those hooks are screw-in,” he said, “you'll want to drill a hole first. Did you take a look at those brochures?”

Kara stopped at the bottom of the stairs.

“A little,” she said, lightly as she dared. “Those schools are...pretty close by, aren't they?”

“So?”

“So...” Kara licked her lips. “I might not have to live on campus.”

“You might.”

The tone was completely neutral. Kara waited for a minute before she crept back upstairs.

She made a hole with the hammer and a smaller nail, then screwed the hook into the hole. Tugging on it didn't seem to budge it, so she hung Ziggy(she decided on the stairs) on the hook.

Kara stepped down from her chair and watched the bird twitter and hop around.

“There,” she said, “you like that? And maybe if this works out, I'll get you a lady friend. I'll call her Iman.” She laughed and stashed the chair in the corner.

She spent the time before dinner on her laptop. There was a blog doing a continuing series on the Crimean war that posted every Friday night. She lost herself in the battle of Sinop until Judy's voice wavered up the stairs, calling her to dinner.

Kara found Judy and Brad already waiting for her, seated gravely at the table. Kara tried to ignore the flesh-crawling sensation that accompanied every family meal now and pulled a chair out.

No one spoke for a half hour. Judy mournfully nursed her salad as Brad put away mashed potatoes and Kara ate green beans quietly as possible. They all looked somewhere else.

Brad broke the silence. “Got some of that molding today. Think it'll go great in the parlor once it's stained.”

Judy folded her hands as if in prayer. Kara swallowed, and it sounded way too loud.

“I got a bird today,” she said in a small voice.

Nothing. No response telling her it was alright, or that she should return the bird and get the money back.

“He's real cute,” she pressed on, “he's the size of a finch and he came with his own little—”

“Did you look at the brochures today?” Judy said.

Kara laid her fork down carefully. “I have.”

Judy was looking down at her plate. “What did you think?”

“Haven't had the time to do proper research,” Kara lied.

Judy nodded, just barely. “Holmwood has a good language program.”

Kara took a breath. “Isn't that quite a drive?”

“Depends.”

“Depends on what?”

“Depends on where you live.”

Kara swallowed down all the objections she couldn't voice, because no one had come right out and said, ' _what are you thinking, getting a degree in history? There's no money in it, and anyway, you're moving out the second you turn eighteen_.'

She was about to say something bland about the weather when the doorbell rang. Both parents tensed simultaneously. Brad stood up and waved his wife and daughter down as he walked to the door. They listened to the front door open. A girl's voice said something indistinct.

“Honey?” Brad's voice was shaking. “you'd better get out here.”

Kara and Judy rose at once. A million things raced through Kara's mind as she ran out into the hall.

It was raining outside. The girl on their front step looked wilted, as if the rain itself had beaten her. She was slim and pale, and her hair fell loose past her shoulders. She was looking desperately from Judy to Brad, an entreating look on her face.

It was Judy who found her voice first. “Who are you? What do you want?”

In a teary voice, the girl whispered, “Mommy?”

 


	2. Chapter 2

Judy had fallen to the floor in stages: first her knees went, then her back hit the wall and she slid down, making animal noises. Brad was shaking, looking at the girl as if he'd seen a ghost.

Which, in a way, was true.

Kara didn't move. It felt like that single word had petrified her. She was welded to the carpet and would never move again.

The girl in the doorway was around Kara's age, with clear brown eyes and straight brown hair. If they had stood beside each other, they might have been within an inch of each other's heights.

 _No_ , Kara thought.

Judy scrabbled at the wall. “It's not—you're not—”

The girl burst into tears. “Mommy, daddy, I finally found you!”

Kara's world promptly cracked in half.

 

They retired to the den; Brad, Judy, and the girl squished together on the sofa, Kara perching on the arm of the recliner.

“—it was so scary, I kept thinking I was gonna die, I was gonna die without ever seeing my mommy and daddy again!” The girl sobbed. They were all crying. Even Kara had hot tears trickling silently down her face, but she couldn't tell why. She was numb, completely numb.

Judy was laughing and crying at the same time and hadn't once let go of the girl.

“But it's not scary anymore, sweetie,” she said, “you're home. You're home, Sarah.”

They embraced.

Kara went to bed around 1am. The others were still sitting up talking on the sofa, they probably didn't need her for that.

Ziggy was on his perch, head under a wing. Kara looked up at him.

“Same,” she said tonelessly.

She didn't even bother to undress before getting under the covers.

The next day she could hear everybody up long before she got in the dining room.

Normally, Brad rose early. Then Kara. Judy often didn't get up until eleven. But now everybody was up and talking and laughing as they made breakfast together. The girl, Sarah, was picking at a plate of pancakes and bacon. Brad was squeezing orange juice. Judy was manning the griddle, looking about ten years younger.

“Kara!” Brad waved. “hi, come in! Take a seat! We've just been telling Sarah about you!”

“I'm so happy you guys have had each other,” Sarah gushed, “'I can't believe I have a sister!”

Kara smiled. At least, her lips went back in a practiced path.

“It'll be nice to know you,” she managed, “after all this time.”

Judy was trembling. Kara could see it before anyone else.

Judy braced herself on the counter and let out a sob.

“Honey?” Brad said.

“Mommy?” Sarah said.

Judy turned down. Her face was a mess of tears.

“I'm fine,” she said, “it's just—we're a family again!”

Kara was stone, stone, stone.

After breakfast, the three of them went to open up Sarah's room, which had been kept pristine since she'd gone. Kara lied and said she had to apply for a scholarship and left on her bike.

She had no reason, absolutely none, to feel like this. All her life, she felt like they had just been waiting for Sarah return. That was a perfectly natural response to such a horrible thing. Sarah was back now, and things could only get better.

Kara had to park for a minute because she was crying too hard to ride the bike.

 

Sarah had requested that they wouldn't go to the police.

“At least,” she demurred, “not right away. I've been through so much already—”

“—no, no pumpkin, not just yet.” Brad covered her hand with his own.

The 'rents had scooted their chairs closer to her end of the table. Kara picked at her fish silently.

“Oh mommy,” Sarah said, “can we spend some time together?”

Judy nodded. “I'm never letting you out of my sight again!”

Kara excused herself before dessert.

Climbing the stairs up to her room, she could still hear them laughing in the kitchen.

Ziggy chirped and flitted from perch to perch. Kara drummed her fingers absently on the bars of his cage.

She hadn't been sure if they'd kick her out when she turned eighteen. They had been pushing schools that were a little too far from the house, perhaps their subtle way of telling her she was on her own when she turned eighteen. Now....

Now....

She sat on her bed.

For two decades, not a word. Not even a sign. They had never stopped looking. She knew. Even this year, she had seen Brad skimming newspaper headlines. They'd set up search alerts for all the buzzwords involved in the case. Sarah had been an open wound between them, one never addressed because it was too painful.

It was awfully convenient.

Kara hugged her pillow. All sorts of paranoid thoughts were trickling into her head. Sarah was an actress hired by her parents to help push her out of the house. Or she was the real thing, and her parents had always known where she was but waited until just now to reveal her. Or she was an impostor, someone who knew about the case and decided she looked enough like the missing heir.

Kara sat up.

That last one didn't actually sound too crazy.

What did they really know about her? She had just suddenly shown up one night, looking just enough like Sarah that they accepted her. Had they quizzed her about shared facts from their pasts? Compared scars?

Kara realized how awful that sounded. But she couldn't stop herself.

She tried to pose the question to Brad tactfully the next day:

“You know—”

“Daddy,” Sarah called, “do you still have that old Parcheesi board?”

She tried to get Judy alone.

“Have you—”

“Mommy!” Sarah burst in, “look what daddy got me!”

Sarah spoke almost exclusively in a high baby voice. She called them 'mommy' and 'daddy' when Kara had never really even been able to manage 'mom' and 'dad.' It was very, very hard, but Kara tried to get past all that. She tried being friendly, or, failing that, polite.

“His name's Ziggy,” she said, showing the bamboo cage to Sarah.

Sarah crinkled her nose. “Like the comic strip?”

Kara thought on that one for a minute. “Sure.” She shrugged.

“What a funny little bird.” Sarah studied it, frowning. “what did you say it was?”

“A cowbird.”

“Why do they call it that?”

“Well—” Kara realized she hadn't looked anything up on the bird since she'd gotten him.

Understandable, under the circumstances.

“Probably because they live near cows,” she bluffed, “they're native to the area.”

“Oh,” Sarah said, “isn't that interesting?” in a tone of voice that implied it was most certainly not interesting. She tripped off to get her nails done with Judy.

Kara sat on the bed with Ziggy on her lap.

Judy had tried. She really had tried. The two of them just didn't have much in common, that was all. Kara hated sitting still for so long, and other people working on her fingers made her ticklish. She really wasn't a manicure kind of girl.

So why did she feel so bereft?

To get her mind off it, she decided to look up Ziggy. He was the one thing she had that Sarah didn't also have. She smiled as she typed in 'cowbird' to the search engine.

A minute later, the smile disappeared from her face.

At first she thought it was funny that one of the related search suggestions was 'cuckoo.' But then she clicked and started reading, and it was like a shot to the heart.

' _parasitic_ ,' she read, ' _lays its eggs in the nests of other birds, the cowbird young will push the host bird's young out of the nest to avoid competition. Should the cowbird eggs be destroyed, the mother cowbird will return to the nest and destroy the host eggs_.'

She looked over at Ziggy and felt sick. How could something so cute be so evil?

Ziggy chirped, blinking his glossy black eyes. He had been born in another bird's nest. Pretended to be their baby while the bird's real children died below.

Kara swallowed, throat suddenly constricting.

People and birds were nothing alike, she thought, there was nothing similar about their situations.

Nothing at all.


	3. Chapter 3

“Sarah will be staying here tomorrow,” Brad said, “while you're at school. But after that, I'd appreciate it if you showed her around a little. You know, normal places. Not just the library and the museum.”

“Yeah, sure, fine,” Kara said. She wound a string of rubbery pizza cheese around her finger.

Sarah was looking adoringly at Judy. “Oh mommy, can we go shopping tomorrow?”

Judy beamed, newly lacquered nails picking mushrooms off her slice. “Of course, sweetie. Can it wait till Kara shows you around?”

“Yeah, sure, fine,” Kara said.

Sarah nodded. In addition to her new floral nails, a ring gleamed on her finger. “I was thinking...I don't have my license. Can I get a bike?”

“You can use Kara's!”

“Yeah, sure, f—” Kara jerked. “Waitaminute, no. I need that. I use it to go to school.”

Everyone at the table turned to her.

“Kara, what a thing to say,” Judy said, astonished at her selfishness. “Why don't you just get a ride to school?”

Kara swallowed. She wasn't going to cry. She wasn't going to cry. “But Brad has to go to work, and you—”

“From one of your school friends?”

Kara swallowed the words _I have no friends at school_ and tried to say, “they don't have a car,” but Sarah cut in.

“I don't want to take _her_ bike.” She gave Kara a generous smile. “I never had a bike of my own growing up. I want something that's completely mine.”

“Oh.” Judy smiled reassuringly, “don't worry, sweetie. You're home now. Everything is yours.”

Kara trudged upstairs after dinner. The family unit was on the sofa, watching one of Brad's cheesy old comedies that he insisted on keeping in VHS format. Kara had never really gotten into them. So she went upstairs into her room and shut the door and then leaned against it.

It had been a closed adoption.

...she guessed. She had never had the courage to ask Judy, afraid it would make it seem like she didn't want Judy as her mother.

They were alike in a lot of ways. Kara tried to list them in her head. They both hated walnuts. They both hated to be seen crying. Judy would run out of the room on some pretext, hide in a closet to keep from being seen.

But...they didn't _like_ the same things, did they? Kara hated girly things: getting her nails done, getting her hair styled, being pampered in boutiques. That was all Judy lived for. And Judy thought history was a waste of time.

Kara looked at the five-volume Herodotus collection on her bookshelf. Yeah. They had some differences.

But didn't all parents?

 _How would you know?_ Asked an awful little voice in her head.

Kara kicked her bed, and then shouted, hopping while clutching her big toe. This excited Ziggy, who flew from bar to bar in his cage, chirping erratically.

“Sweetie, can you keep your bird down?” Brad called.

Kara stood in the middle of her floor with a throbbing toe and felt very sorry for herself.

 

The next few days were excellent practice in being invisible. If Sarah was in the room, it was just like Kara didn't exist. And if she wasn't in the room, her parent's minds were constantly on her.

Kara tried to focus on other things. She studied the college brochures and researched affordable housing. The 'rents probably wouldn't pay for her college now, so she looked up scholarships. With her grades, she qualified for more than a few. But they weren't in the language arts, like Judy had been pushing.

What did it matter?

Kara pondered to herself.

It had been so hard-wired into her brain to please them, to never let them down, it was hard to shrug off even now.

And for all her shuffling, for all her suppression of her wants and desires, had they ever smiled at Kara the way they did at Sarah?

Kara's gaze wandered to Ziggy. He wasn't so cute now that she knew what he was. She half-wanted to let him out of his cage, but then she worried about the other birds his future offspring would destroy.

She blinked and shook herself.

That was a...silly train of thought. Ziggy wasn't evil. He was just a bird.

She was just hungry, that's all. Cranky. She needed a snack.

“—Kara's going to college in the fall,” Judy was saying as the kitchen door swung open. “She'll major in—oh, Kara! We were just talking about you!”

Too late to turn back and pretend she wasn't there. Kara smiled.

“Yes, we were talking about college,” she ventured.

Sarah and Judy smiled.

“You see?” Judy said, “and if we can get you in the same college, you girls can keep an eye out for each other!”

Kara's stomach dropped. She tried not to let it show on her face, but something must have slipped through because Sarah's expression changed slightly. She noticed. Kara fought down panic.

“I'll get some of the brochures,” Judy said, exiting, stage right.

The girls were alone together. For the first time since Sarah had arrived, Kara realized.

Sarah was leaning back against the counter, smiling casually. It put Kara on edge.

“So, um.” She coughed. “Did you...go to school...where you were?”

Sarah gave a noncommittal shrug. Kara let the subject drop. She crossed her arms, looking around the kitchen as if she'd receive some cue from that.

“Must be nice,” Sarah said out of nowhere.

“Excuse me?”

“College.” Sarah waved, indicating the house. “Living at home. Money. Must be nice.”

Kara smiled. It was a reflex, she did it whenever she didn't know what to do in a situation. “Yeah, but...it's yours too, isn't it?”

Sarah's smile turned sardonic. “Yeah. Isn't that nice?”

Kara shifted on her feet. “Y-yeah?”

“Know what else is nice?”

Kara stared at the other girl. Sarah leaned forward, speaking in a stage whisper:

“Living in my house. With my parents. Bet that was nice, wasn't it?”

Kara backed away. Sarah advanced.

“I bet you thought you had it made in the shade, didn't you? Thought you'd just push me out of my own life? Well guess what? They only adopted you because I was gone. Now I'm back, there's no reason for you to be here anymore.”

It was everything she'd secretly feared, everything she hoped wasn't true.

Sarah was scary up close. The smile was more of a grimace and it did unflattering things to her face. It made crow's feet appear, networks of tiny lines where none had been before.

“Know why they adopted you? Because they knew I'd come back. They didn't want to replace me with a real child, one they had themselves. Why don't you go find your real family?”

Kara was backed against a counter, leaning as far away as she could. Sarah triumphantly tossed a lock of hair over her shoulder.

“Found them!” Judy bustled in. “hope you're ready to look at some schools!”

Kara straightened up and robotically walked out.

 

The town museum had a statue of their founder in the lobby. Kara stared at him, trying to will away the blurriness of her vision.

It was wrong. Sarah was wrong. She hadn't pushed anybody out. She had a place here. She had a family.

The statue started to wobble. Kara wiped her eyes.

Okay, maybe her parents didn't love her as much as they did their real daughter. But that didn't mean she should leave.

“Hey, kiddo!”

Kara nearly fell off the bench in shock. “Brad?”

Brad walked across the lobby to her. “What's the matter? Sarah said you just sort of stormed off.”

Kara swallowed. Well, that was one way to put it. “I'm...I'm just...”

Brad sat down on the bench next to her. “It's just as well. I've been meaning to have this talk with you.”

Kara's heart promptly turned to stone and sank. This was it.

Brad was looking at the hair on his forearms, stroking them first one way, then the other. “There's no easy way to say this...I mean, I'd hoped I wouldn't  _have_ to say it.”

Kara was already mentally packing her room. The laptop could travel with, the bed and other furniture would need to be sent for...

Brad sighed. “I guess we've been so caught up in ourselves the past few days. I'm sorry. But just because Sarah's home doesn't mean we've stopped loving you.”

Kara nodded. Of course they didn't. They loved her the same amount they always had. Very little.

Brad slid an arm around her shoulder. She repressed a flinch.

“Your mom took it hard, you know?” he said confidentially, “I mean, we both had. But she carried Sarah inside her. That's something I can't measure up to. And when you lose something like that...there's an ache that never goes away.”

Kara nodded. Yes, yes. All very natural.

“But for me...that ache went away when you came into our lives.”

Kara tensed like she'd been hit in the stomach. Brad's arm contracted, bringing her up to his side.

“You'll always be our daughter,” he said, nuzzling the top of her head, “even though you never really called me dad, I never felt I wasn't. And your mom may like all that girly stuff, but you...you put a hook up in your room with _my_ tools.”

Kara blinked. She didn't trust her voice.

Brad was smiling, openly and honestly.

“Come home, pumpkin,” he said softly.

 

No one talked about it at dinner. Sarah and Judy still brought the bulk of the dinner conversation, but Brad made an admirable effort to shift some of it over to Kara. After dinner, she joined them in the living room. Tonight's movie was Caddyshack, not one of her favorites, but she stayed and she laughed and felt like she meant it some of the time.

She went to bed before all the others, but Brad pressed a kiss to the top of her head and Judy did wish her goodnight, even if it was in a pause between Sarah anecdotes. Sarah gave her a beatific smile. Kara tried to keep her back from crawling as she went to bed.

She had a dream about eggs smashing on the ground, one by one. She tried putting her hands out to catch them, but they sailed past her useless grasp. Despairing, she looked around the nest for the cowbird, hoping to put a stop to it.

There was no one else in the nest.

She woke in a horrible funk, feeling less rested than she had when she'd gone to bed. Stretching put a cramp in her muscles. She nearly tripped over a fold in the rug. When she went to open the bird food, she ripped the bag wide open, spilling it all over the floor. Kara swore and began scooping it up with her hands.

“Looks like you're getting a big breakfast today, Ziggy,” she said as she straightened up.

The birdcage was empty.


	4. Chapter 4

Kara crept downstairs.

Sarah was in the parlor, reading a book and lounging with her feet up. She had a tiny smile on her face. Kara stood in the doorway and spoke calmly as she could.

“Sarah. Have you seen my bird?”

Sarah shrugged, smile widening.

“He's not in his cage.”

Sarah stretched on the couch.

“He couldn't have got out on his own.”

Sarah flipped a page nonchalantly.

“You were in my room last night.” There. It was out.

Sarah set the book on the table and stood up. “Hold on, _your_ room? This is _my_ house!”

“I live here too.” Kara couldn't keep her voice from shaking.

Sarah found this funny. “You think that gives you rights? My parents own the house, and I'm their daughter.”

“You're not their only daughter.”

“I'm their _real_ one.” Sarah smirked. “you're just a placeholder.”

There was a gilt mirror on the wall behind Sarah. Kara could see Sarah's back, the frilly print blouse Judy had bought her only yesterday, and beyond that her own face, her eyes gleaming like mismatched jewels. Neither one thing or the other. That was her life.

Kara's hands itched.

Sarah pushed her chin forward. “Aww, did I make you mad? I'm just telling the truth sweetheart.”

_The empty nest. The eggs all smashed on the ground._

“You don't deserve to live here. You stole my life. Why don't you just leave us alone?”

Sarah's voice never went rough, it was breezy and conversational as if she was discussing the weather.

“Your own mom didn't even want you, why the hell do you think mine would?”

Kara watched her own face in the mirror. It was perfectly placid and calm. Her wrists flexed.

“Just get out. Get out before we throw you out.”

Kara came forward like a cannon shot. She heaved an unprepared Sarah backwards off her feet—into the mirror.

Empty nest, empty nest, empty nest.

Kara didn't throw punches. She just held onto Sarah's shoulders and rammed her back into the wall again and again. There was shouting. Kara was distantly aware of it, but she didn't connect it to her situation until she was roughly yanked off Sarah.

“My god, what are you doing?” Judy shoved her away. “Sarah!”

Sarah sat with her legs splayed out, crying showily, grinding one fist into her eye. She wailed a big “mommy!” and buried her face in Judy's shirt.

Kara calmly walked out of the room, got her bike, and rode away.

At first she thought she was looking for Ziggy, then she realized she'd never catch him. He was native to the area. Probably already shacking up with some little egg-murderer.

Kara found a bus bench and sat down.

She hadn't wanted Ziggy gone. Some things about him revolted her, sure, but he hadn't been evil. All he'd done was twitter around his cage and sleep.

It wasn't just that, Kara reflected, it was the fact that he had been _taken_ from her. She might have let him go, eventually. She might even have returned him to the shop. But instead he had been taken, just to hurt her.

She thought of Judy, waiting at home, waiting for a single phone call, waiting with every door and window open in hopes that their daughter might fly back into their lives. She imagined this pain stretched out over decades, a thousand times longer and a thousand times worse. For the first time, Kara felt she might understand the smallest atom of what her mother went through.

Kara's hand was bleeding. Mirror shards had stuck into her skin, but she had been on such an adrenaline high she hadn't even noticed. Now she pulled them out with the mini-tweezers from her bike's first aid kit. Even thought they were tiny, they bled a lot.

And if these tiny little nicks were bleeding like this, how were Sarah's injuries?

Shame descended.

Kara bandaged her hands as best she could and got back on her bike.

The return journey seemed to take longer, require more effort. She was about near collapse by the time she turned on their street.

There were police cars in the driveway.

 

Kara pumped as hard as she could, standing on the pedals at times. She had to get away. She had to think.

The museum was too obvious. The library had security cameras on the outside.

There was a weedy little botanical garden a few blocks away. Kara stashed her bike in some bushes and then crawled beneath a nearby hawthorn, drawing her knees up to her chest.

She was probably wanted for attempted murder. Great.

Even if Judy had been near, had heard the ugly things Sarah was saying, she probably still wouldn't take Kara's side over her real daughter's.

Little songbirds twittered in the canopy above her. Kara felt a pang for Ziggy.

...well, that was it, then. She'd be eighteen soon. A legal adult. She could lay low for a while. Stay in shelters. Once she got out of town, it would be easy enough to keep going. And if she lived on her own, that meant no one could abandon her any more.

Kara held herself, sitting in the bush, until sundown.

 

She just needed a few things. Laptop. Clothes, of course. Money. She could travel by bike.

The house lights were off when she crept up. Her bike had been stashed in a stand of bamboo down the road.

She hugged the garage wall to avoid setting off the sensor light in front of the garage. Brad's car was gone. Maybe he'd tried to find her.

Kara swallowed that thought down for later.

The security system hadn't been set yet. Kara thanked her lucky stars as she snuck in the washroom door.

She kept an ear out for any movement, but the house was completely dark. They were probably all out looking for her.

The kitchen was empty. She held the door so it didn't swing shut and proceeded through the dark dining room.

“You're home,” Judy said.


	5. Chapter 5

Kara stopped, frozen in place. As her eyes adjusted to the dark, she could see that yes, Judy was sitting in the dining room with all the lights off.

Judy was resting her temple on her left hand. Her voice was dull and level, as if she'd expended all her allotted emotions for the day.

“Brad's out looking for you,” she said, “I stayed here. In case you came back. And you did.”

There was a small glass of red wine in her hand. Judy took a sip.

“I took Sarah to the doctor after you left. She needed some stitches. That was it.”

Kara said nothing. She knew what was coming.

Judy rubbed the rim of her glass absently. “She told us you attacked her. We said that didn't sound like you. She said you'd been saying horrible things to try and scare her away.”

Kara's throat tightened but she said nothing. Clothes, money, laptop. Then she would be free.

Judy took another sip of red wine. “That's when I asked her whether she'd agree to have a blood test done.”

The refrigerator kicked on, buzzing in the empty stillness.

“She was very, very, hurt,” Judy went on, “she said if I trusted her, loved her, I wouldn't subject her to that.”

Another sip.

“Then I told her I'd already had it done.”

Kara's eyebrows lifted of their own accord.

“Told her I'd done it with the blood she'd lost from the glass shards, had rush results done.” Judy set the cup down. “I said she was the wrong blood type. She said nothing for a minute. Then she attacked me.”

Kara felt all the strength drain from her limbs. She shook.

Judy shook her head, shading her eyes with her hand. “Even if we had done a blood test, I would have known. I think I suspected from day one, honestly. She knew all about the things Sarah loved, but there are little things. Things a mother should know. And there was something...off about her, like she was acting younger than she actually was. But me—” Judy let out a bitter laugh, “I went along with it, because my body was telling my brain, ' _you have Sarah back_ '!”

Kara steadied herself on a chair.

“We called the cops on her. Turns out she's got a record of this sort of thing. And she's in her thirties.” Judy let out another mirthless chuckle. “Thirties! And I bought it hook, line, and sinker because I wanted Sarah to be alive, wanted not to have failed as a parent.”

Kara swallowed. Her throat had tightened up again.

“And then I thought to myself, ' _just what the hell are you doing_?'” Her voice, which had made an admirable effort to be steady in the beginning, had started shaking. “Who did you take to her first day of school? Who went with you to the salons and beauty parlors even though she hated it? Who was going into a major she didn't like because you told her there was no future in the one she wanted?' I had a daughter all along, and I was willing to drop her for an illusion?”

Kara's chest felt tight. She had started drifting forward at some point. Now she was a single chair away.

Judy met her eyes, finally.

“I know I don't deserve this,” she said quietly, “and I know I've given you more than enough grief, but please...if it's at all possible...could you put off moving out...just for a little while?”

Kara said, “Mom.”

The room was dark, so nobody saw them cry.

 

Kara was humming to herself as she dismounted her bike. The extra bird feed she had strewn about the garden. Out of all the bird that came to graze, she saw not a single one with a black body and brown head. The bamboo cage and its silk cover she carried now, back to the pet shop.

After all, someone else could probably use it.

She got two surprises when she walked up to the building.

The first was a “we've moved!” sign on the ornate red doors, but no forwarding address.

The second was a scruffy blond man who was kicking the doors and swearing.

He hadn't shaven in some time, but he was still handsome in a messy way.

Kara halted uncertainly.

The man caught sight of her and wheeled around. “Miss! You have to tell me—was there a pet shop here recently?”

Kara nodded, giving the man a generous berth. He flipped open a badge wallet, too fast for her to properly see.

“Leon Orcot, LAPD.” He straightened up, tried to appear professional. It did not work. “Have you recently purchased an animal from the proprietor?”

“Y-yes.” she smiled nervously, “It didn't go so well, though.”

“Aha!” Leon's finger jabbed accusingly at the door.

“Someone let my bird out of its cage.”

Leon wilted. He looked like a man who had not had enough sleep or showers in a year.

“What did the owner look like?” he asked in a more subdued tone.

Kara described the mysterious man. Leon nodded along, as if it were a song he were familiar with..

“Just missed him.” Leon thumped the doors with his fist. “Well, I'll be continuing my investigation, it seems. Thank you, young lady.”

“Sure,” Kara said. “Hey, could you use a bird cage?”

Leon looked at the cage and smiled. He looked almost wistful.

“Not where I'm going.”

The man and the girl parted ways. Above them, a plain brown bird sat on a wire. A glossy black bird with a brown head swooped down next to it. They flew away twittering.


End file.
